Experts Discover Something “Better than Alcohol”

If you’re a doctor, you probably think you’re invincible. You get exposed to multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis but all you wear is a thin mask. You do your rounds almost every day but you don’t really wash your hands in between patients.

Yep, just because you’re a doctor, you probably think you’re some sort of Superman.

Okay, fine, you probably are. After all, you’re saving people. But just like Superman, you definitely have a kryptonite: your stubbornness.

Doctors’ Hands: Dirtiest in the Hospital?

Admit it! You don’t really wash your hands properly. And before you say, “Oh, yes, I do!” just think of how many times you wash your hands when you visit a patient in his room. You probably wash your hands when you get to the nurses’ station, but do you wash your hands inside the room?

Believe it or not, that’s one of the five instances when you are required to wash your hands. You are, after all, arguably the most effective disease carrier in the hospital.

Doctors don’t wash their hands two out of five times that they should.

Doctors are the most non-compliant when it comes to infection control protocols! The thing is, germs probably don’t disgust you if you wear a white coat.

But picture this: You’re on duty and you’re about to have dinner. You haven’t washed your hands. There’s a queue to the restroom, what with all the junior and senior medical interns preparing to have dinner, too.

Thank God you have alcogel in your bag! You squeeze out the cool gel and imagine a nuclear bomb detonating on your hands’ germs. There, your hands are finally clean. Or are they?

That alcogel you’re carrying in your bag is doing a piss-poor job of eliminating viruses compared to other products meant for hand hygiene (just like the one I’m about to mention).

Why Doctors Should Use Softa-Man

In a nutshell, Softa-Man is better than alcohol. Hospitals who carry Softa-Man, in my opinion, are doing their doctors (and their patients!) a world of good. Here’s why.

Softa-Man raises hand hygiene compliance. Sure, other products are “good enough” for hand disinfection. But if a doctor or a nurse has to wash his hands 20 times during his shift, he will end up with dry hands – and he probably will try to lessen the number of times he washes his hands the next time!

However, withSofta-Man, compliance isn’t an issue. It has a nice smell, plus your hands feel great after you use it!

Softa-Man kills more germs than other alcohol-based products. The alcohol your hospital carries – yes, even the Sterilium – kills bacteria more than viruses. Softa-Man, on the other hand, is efficient at killing viruses, bacteria, and fungi. Remember that we’re talking about “hospital-grade” bacteria here, the type that cause serious illness!

Softa-Man disinfects in less than 30 seconds. For an alcohol-based hand rub to have high standards of disinfection, they must disinfect in 30 seconds or less. Softa-Man takes it to the next level: It disinfects in 15 seconds! (Surgical disinfection takes just a minute, too – and no other alcohol can do that.)

Doctors can clip on a bottle of Softa-Man onto their belts. It comes with a plastic contraption so that you can clip the Softa-Man onto your belt, pretty much like how old-school doctors do so with their pagers. It makes hand hygiene so convenient!

Softa-Man is under the B.Braun brand. That alone is enough, if you ask me. You see, Mr. Braun likes to spread the wealth. He’s actually willing to spend more and invest in people than in saving money if doing so lessens job opportunities. Spreading the wealth is not just a corporate social responsibility (CSR); it’s an individual social responsibility.

Priced at PhP150 per bottle, it’s a cheap ounce of prevention. Spending thousands of pesos on hospital-acquired infections is obviously not the penny-saver here. Using Softa-Man and increasing hand hygiene compliance is actually going to save any hospital a lot of money in the long run!

If you want your nearest hospital to carry the Softa-Man brand, ask them why they don’t yet. Now, tell me why you shouldn’t have B.Braun’s Softa-Man in your bag.

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About the bloggerStef dela Cruz is a doctor and writer. She received the 2013 Award for Health Media from the Department of Health. She maintains a health column in Health.Care Magazine and a cat welfare column in The Manila Bulletin's Animal Scene. Add her Google profile to your circles.

2 comments:

Hi, Raymond, I think it's not available for retail (yet) as it's supposed to be something that doctors can use in the hospital. BUT the good news is, everything is under negotiations and Softa-Man just might be available in drugstores soon enough!

Can't wait to see B.Braun in drugstores. When that happens, it should up the ante, don't you think? :)

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